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 Forty and Fed Up?Tracy Smeathers was fed up with the mundanity of her life. With her fortieth birthday looming she made a momentous decision to give up her job after nineteen years and travel the world. Eleven countries later and two weeks short of a year, Tracy writes... 'How many of us at some time or another think life just has to have more to offer than this? Most of us, if we are truthful. That is how I felt in 2003, which is why I packed up my job after 19 years, rented out my home and backpacked round the world for a year. Once I had decided to do it the rest was relatively easy. It was about making the break. So, where to start? I had always had a fascination with India. Bizarre though it might sound, I wanted to see that poverty up close. I had recently seen a TV documentary about an Eastern European trading in human organs in India, primarily kidneys but also eyes. I really wanted to see what sort of ungodly circumstances such people must live in to have to resort to such extreme actions. I took a voluntary media placement with i-to-i and worked for two months with a political/social activist fighting for the rights of the urban slum dwellers of Bangalore - ironically the IT capital of India. My role was to visit the slums and document the progress that had been made in an effort to raise the organisation's profile and ultimately raise funds. Click here >> for placements with i-to-i I travelled for a month after my volunteer work, taking trains up through Goa and Bombay, around Rajastan and onto Delhi staying in rooms for about two pounds a night. My only conditions were that the bed was clean, I had access to hot water and a western loo - I could put up with everything else. Visiting Varanarsi, India's holiest city by the Ganges, was a highlight of the trip; squatting on communal squat loos and the constant spitting were downsides... seeing those with leprosy was the most heart-wrenching. My next stop was Hong Kong for a few days. It felt very strange after India. All of a sudden I noticed that everyone seemed to wear glasses and the place seemed to be full of kissing couples. I liked Hong Kong. It had a good mix of tradition and modernity. And so on to Thailand... I didn’t like Bangkok but I enjoyed the beaches of the far south (fortunately ahead of the Tsunami disaster) and the mountains and trekking of the north. It felt like a safe country in which to travel although there were a lot of travellers who seemed to just spend their time 'hanging out', smoking the old 'wacky backy' and saying 'cool man' a lot. Then on to Singapore and my first experience of a dorm. I was not struck by Singapore. It was all a bit soulless to me. Next stop Australia where I ended up staying for nearly four months camping (also for the first time) and hostelling. As I was too old to get a working visa, but wanted a break from constant travelling, I took part in a scheme called WWOOFING (Willing Workers On Organic Farms). In return for so many hours’ work, volunteers get free board and lodging. I loved it. I met such great people and got to do all sorts of things I never otherwise would have done. These included working in a bat rescue centre (my God they can bite), a goat stud farm (I was naively thinking billy goats, in reality they were more like wildebeest), a winery (much more sedate), a beef cattle farm (where the owners had in their youth been arrested for alleged gun running in Manila!) and a final placement south of Perth where, much to my dismay, I ended up cleaning windows and polishing silver for four days. Click here >> for more info about WWOOFING Next New Zealand in a campervan with a friend for seven weeks and lots of Super 12 rugby games. New Zealand was totally unspoilt and the walking and the scenery is amazing but don't go if you want a nightlife - particularly one slightly out of season - everything closes down by 8pm. Considering the size of the country it takes an excruciating amount of time to get from A to B - which is probably why I ended up with a speeding ticket. I was most upset. I didn't even get a warning; I was elevated straight to fine stage. I vowed never to return. Then French Polynesia. Surprisingly this is somewhere I would not recommend unless you really do want to do nothing and are prepared to do battle with all the stray dogs (apparently they used to eat them until recently). Having to take a heavy stick to walk along the beach is not my idea of heaven.  And finally to South America. First stop Chile and Santiago, the entry point from New Zealand. I felt like I had taken a vow of silence. I couldn't speak any Spanish and I somehow managed to book myself into a hostel where I was the only resident. It was incredibly cold and depressing. A couple of day trips, a day snowboarding and that was enough. I left, unlikely to ever return.Peru was wonderful, although the 24-hour bus journey from Lima to Cusco was not. Being thrown around like a doll while ascending the Andes for hours on end is not fun. I've never met a nun before but I sat next to one on the journey. I wonder if all nuns suck boiled sweets loudly, play bingo and love films with lots of sex and violence? Unable to get on the Machu Picchu trek, I opted for an alternative four-day trek to some lesser-known ruins at Choquequira. It was only at 3:30 in the morning when I was collected from my hostel that I was told I was the only one on the trip. So me, the cook, the porter, the guide and the horses took off for four days into the unknown not knowing whether I was being brave or just plain stupid. Over those four days I walked for 35 hours. Thankfully I was too shattered to worry about whether anyone would try and rob me or have their wicked way with me. The worst I came back with was blisters on top of blisters, two black toenails and arms and legs like pin cushions. Then to Manu and a nine-day jungle trip. One thing I became sure of very early on in this trip was that I am not a ‘twitcher’. How anyone can get pleasure out of sitting on a boat for hours and hours at a time, looking through binoculars hoping to get a very poor siting of a speck of colour in the distance I will never know. Very loud Canadian, Danny, obviously did not feel this way given the number of 'wows' he vocalised and the copious notes he took each evening. A couple of more weeks in the south of Peru and then onto Ecuador for a few days in its capital Quito and then I was home - satisfied, content and confident about the future - whatever it might hold.'  Click here >> for more info about round the world travel |
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